Gillingham 0 Bristol City 2

Match 12/13/1039 - Tuesday, 6th August 2013 - Capital One Cup 1R

Gillingham (0) 0
Bristol City (1) 2 Baldock 21, Wynter 67
Att. 2,585

Entrance: £15
Programme: £2
Mileage: 45/544

Match Report

Don't panic Mr Mainwaring, exclaimed Corporal Jones when, in the much-loved 1970s sitcom Dad's Army, the aged member of the Home Guard scurried around like a headless chicken. The unnecessary and unwarranted boos that greeted the final whistle of this Capital One First Round tie suggests there are a few Corporal Jones in our midst, but two defeats at the start of the season is not the equivalent of the Germans marching through the high street of Walmington-on-Sea.

The draw had thrown together two serial failures in Round One of this competition. In the last four years, only once had either team progressed to the second round and that was last season when Gillingham won through. . . at Bristol City. Perfect symmetry seemed an almost inevitable conclusion.

A seat on the bench for Saturday's League opener assured a place in the team with the exception of the reserve goalkeeper as Martin Allen rotated his squad to give everybody available an early season run-out. The day had opened badly with the news that Matt Fish, who went down injured in just the third minute of Saturday's game had suffered a serious cruciate injury that will sideline him for a minimum of six months. In his place, Michael Harriman, a 20-year-old full back from Queen's Park Rangers was drafted in on a 28 day loan.

Bristol City won the game with a goal in each half with a degree of comfort which, at least suggested, that they would be one of the clubs in and around the play-off places at the end of the season. The Robins passed their way through a Gillingham midfield that was woefully poor and does leave something for Corporal Jones to worry about.

The visitors broke the deadlock in the 21st when the impressive Jay Emmanuel-Thomas weaved his way past Harriman to lay on a plate a close range opportunity for Sam Baldock. In fairness to Harriman, this was about the only time he was left wanting, and his speed and willingness to get forward was a welcome sight in the wake of Fish's long term absence.

Adebayo Akinfenwa should have equalised immediately but steered his header over the bar, a similar opportunity was also spurned later in the half as the Big Man made a disappointing return to competitive action at Priestfield.

Overrun in midfield, Gillingham were thankful for the reflexes of Stuart Nelson and good fortune to keep their goal intact in the early part of the second half. Jordan Wynter headed against the bar after Nelson had made a fine save when it seemed easier to score.

The ineffective partnership of Akinfenwa and Antonio German was withdrawn on the hour and replaced with Cody McDonald and Danny Kedwell and the subsequent introduction of Myles Weston sparked the home side into positive action but not before the visitors finally doubled their advantage. Emmanuel-Thomas' shot took a wicked deflection off Adam Barrett to fall kindly into the path of Wynter to fire past Nelson.

I'm not going to panic, Mr Mainwaring, but I fear there is, if not a doomsday, a serious impending scenario. The rest of August's fixtures are against teams that are expected to be among the challengers for promotion come the end of the season. It is not unreasonable to fear that we could enter September still on zero points and the opening two matches of that month are tricky away games and from there the pressure is going to really build. The difference in quality between the two divisions is significant, in fact, it appears to me to be a wider gap than when we last came up and we know that ended in tears.

This can be turned around, but not with the wafer-thin squad that we possess at this moment in time. Some quality in midfield needs to be brought in via the loan market, what we saw of Harriman leads me to believe there must be some 20-year-olds not quite cutting it in the Championship that are capable of doing a job in League One, they just have to be unearthed and we have to believe that Martin Allen and his management team are up to that particular task.

I'm hopeful that Linganzi will find his feet, pretty sure Weston, who had a good 25 minutes in this match, and Whelpdale can be influential, but honestly believe we need that one central midfielder that creates something out of nothing, because if we have somebody that can supply the bullets, surely there is a combination up front that can supply the finish.

We're all doomed! . . . far from it, Private Frazer.